Chapter 116: Forty-Eight vol.2
As she listened to the strum of a guitar, Rose looked at her bank account with a contented grin.
'115k lixels. . .being a dungeoneer really is one of the gateways to riches.'
Rose was amazed at the amount she now had. At one point she had struggled in the slums merely to sustain herself, and now she was flowing in lixels. Each of the trio had received 64.8k lixels today. It was almost as if they were printing money. She and Elsa were already ahead of their timestamp to make 1 million lixels each.
It was the result of completing a floor in which they were flooded by a horde of beasts, and Elsa's personal 6th floor which had been littered with mana cores. As well, not all the mana cores had been low-grade. Some had been medium-grade, and some had been high-grade. Rose didn't know the difference between them aside from their price; the first were sold for 1.8k each, the second for 3.5k each, and the third for 9k each.
'Oh? The guitar's stopped,' Rose thought, drifting her thoughts away from lixels and her future and back to the here and now. She stood from their living room couch, stretching lightly even as she didn't need to. Having lived with her for a while now, including both the slums and Alos, she had been somewhat infected by Elsa's behaviors. 'It feels good to stretch though, I'll give her that.'
"Rose."
Rose blinked her eyes and turned around. There, behind the couch, Elsa stood, staring at her. She had never seen the girl look so deathly serious before, her eyes almost piercing into her. She looked behind the girl, spotting Lilias in the hallway, then back at Elsa.
". . .what is it?" Rose asked.
Elsa took a breath.
"So. . ."
"So. . ?" Rose tilted her head.
The girl before her gulped, fiddling with her hands behind the couch, before finally placing them onto it, gripping the sofa firmly as if she could claw through them. Her black eyes met Rose's golden irises, then, she spoke.
"I'm in love with you," Elsa said.
Rose blinked her eyes. Though her dead heart did not fluctuate, her brain spun and clawed at drifting thoughts. Then, when she realized they were leading to nowhere, she stopped them.
"What?" She asked.
Elsa found herself grinning at that expected confusion.
"I've been in love with you for a while now, Rose," She said, once more, her heart pounding within her chest. Even as it threatened to rip out, she continued speaking. "I thought about waiting until I was stronger but, in the end. . ."
She paused, grasping for the right words. Why was she confessing? What exactly did she want from the result of the confession? If she could spill out the entirety of her heart, what would it say? Though she couldn't pinpoint it all exactly, she nevertheless spoke what she could.
"I wanna be something deeper to you than just companions or friends," She said, a blush crossing her cheeks, she realized she was sounding selfish, but she'd be damned if she stopped now, "And I wanna hold you closer to me."
She stared at Rose's unshaken eyes as her own shook.
"So," She spoke as she gripped the couch tighter, "Will you accept me?"
Rose was silent, processing her words. 'Love,' She thought. She had thought about that word before. Of course, she loved Elsa as a friend, but she knew that wasn't the same thing as what they were speaking of. Romantic love, to her, was a foreign thing.
However, there had been moments when her emotions seemed to tether at the edge. There had been moments when she had wanted a deeper connection with Elsa. Times when she thought the girl cute, and times when she willingly indulged her small advances. She knew that much.
"Though I understand it, I don't really know what love is," Rose muttered.
She did not think she knew what it was. All she thought was that she too wouldn't mind having Elsa closer to her. What that exactly meant? She didn't really know. It was an odd feeling. As logical as she thought she was, she couldn't think her way through this specific emotion. So, in the end, she thought, would it be so bad to try and love Elsa after all?
"However, if you're willing to accept that I will need to learn to love you," Rose said, smiling, "Then I accept you."
Elsa's eyes widened, a grin tugging at the corner of her lips.
"R-really?" She asked.
Rose nodded, grinning as well. "Honestly, you were a bit air-headed if you thought I'd only accept your feelings if you were stronger."
Elsa laughed, shrugging.
"Yeah. . .yeah I kinda was."
Lilias chuckled as she watched the two.
There was no overblown moment where they had both realized that they loved each other in the middle of battle, one dying within the other's arms. There was only one person finding the courage to confess her honest feelings, and the other happy at the thought to, at the very least, try a relationship and see if she could reciprocate them.
'At the end of the day. . .' Lilias thought, 'That was enough.'
As the dragonian wondered how a genuine relationship between a homunculus and a human would pan out, Rose and Elsa were a bit confused, staring at one another, one of them blushing.
'Wait, what now?' They both thought.
Lilias raised a brow at the strange sight, then sighed. "Shouldn't you two kiss?"
Elsa jumped in place, glaring back at her with a face flushing.
"Shut the fuck up! What are you still doing here?!"
Lilias merely shrugged.
"A kiss huh. . ." Rose muttered.
At one point, she had been forced into a kiss, and now she had the chance to do it of her own violation. She realized, even as she still fought for more, chasing it, she now had the freedom to enter a relationship of her own bidding. Certainly, she wasn't entirely free as of yet, but that didn't matter.
Rose walked forward.
Her knees placed upon the couch, she touched Elsa's face.
"Wha-what the heck are you doing?!"
"I wouldn't mind a kiss."
Though the taller girl had to bend, their lips came together as Rose's held Elsa's hand, feeling as it softened its grip on the couch. Their eyes closed within that space. At that moment, their minds drifted away from anything but the kiss as a soft wind blew about the room and mana danced around their forms.
Watching that phenomenon of true magic, the dragonian shook her head at the realization that Rose had unlocked her second element and turned around.
'Love highlighted her freedom,' She thought, chuckling and leaving the two alone, 'And freedom brought her wind.'
To her, it seemed quite beautiful. In the end, she thought she now understood her brother's actions a bit more.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
LotsChrono
LotsChrono Yup, there's no overblown climactic moment. Just a normal, genuine, confession and a kiss to commemorate the moment. It's my belief, after all, that my characters aren't the type to beat around the bush for too long. Aren't you guys happy that Lilias was there? If she wasn't, they might not have even kissed, imagine!
Anyhow, the next chapter ends this arc if I don't change anything. This volume was actually paced slower than I originally expected, I'm even debating ending the volume with this arc. . .it's already leagues longer than the previous when it comes to word/page count, so I think I will do just that.
It has also come to my attention that 'R. A. T. H' is gonna have a lot of volumes when all is set and done. . .sigh.
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